I was going to do something different today- had drinks with the actual, physical Lutt-man you have been reading about. Jon-Without showed up, since we broke with tradition and ventured to one of the sites on the Bucket List, since Lutt-man was staying down by Union Station for a conference and the famed Dubliner Bar […]

Editor’s note: I had dug out the following account of my first visit to Cannes, the jewel-like city on the Cote d’Azure and my first encounter with the vivacious and extraordinary Maitre Avery Glize-Kane. She is one of those women who captivates at first meeting, and stays with you in memory the rest of your […]

04 May 2016 Editor’s Note: If you think you are going to get incisive commentary on what happened last night when I was getting the coffeemaker set up for the morning ritual, that amazing concession and the realization of what it is likely to be like for the next six months, you are not going […]

02 DEC 1989: Day dawned raw and gray and blowing with 8-10ft seas; not that I could really see them. Had to watch it on the PLAT monitor. The announcement ran all day: “All hands remain clear of weather decks and sponsons due to high winds and heavy seas.” We had an aggressive flight program […]

OK, I know we are bouncing around a little bit, like on the waves during the Salt Water Summit, the one where the General Secretary of the Communist Part of the USSR decided that it was all about over, and he needed to salvage what he could out of the wreckage. President George H.W. Bush […]

“May Day” all over today. Not a peep out of the Soviets. Oh, wait, I know. But back in 1989 it was not so quiet…. Giant Snake Burrowing Rockets (1989 image of the Kirov-class Battlecruiser deployed to the med). 13 DEC: The nightmare begins again. I don’t know quite how to put this, but each […]

So, it was the annual NIP Spring Luncheon, known for the camaraderie shared with old shipmates, and the young people who are serving now in waters as ominous as any in recent years. there is a lot going on in Naval Intelligence, and the professional organization that was founded more than a quarter century ago […]

06 Dec: Up early, hangover not withstanding, to read the message boards and plot our escape. Not to be. DCAG insisting we stay to support the possibility of a Distinguished Visitor Visit, which didn’t occur. Biding my time, I watched Star Trek in my stateroom until 1430, when I finally wandered back up to CAG […]

At the AFSOUTH Club, I tried to get on a phone and then, worse, when I did I had to try to figure out how to use it. By the time I cracked the code and get a Transatlantic line there is no one home to speak to. The Italians can’t hold a candle to […]

Editor’s Note: I had a chance to find out the thousand-dollar surprise for April, and didn’t even have to wait until the end of the month. New spectacles are the order of the day, since I dropped the perfectly serviceable ones from the night table and they hit with precisely the perfect impact point to […]